


Camlann

by MrProphet



Category: Arthurian Mythology
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-22
Updated: 2017-04-22
Packaged: 2018-10-22 12:48:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,023
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10697343
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MrProphet/pseuds/MrProphet





	Camlann

The sun set over the bright field of Camlann. The sweet, green grass of the plain had been soaked in gore and trampled into mud beneath the hooves of horses and the feet of soldiers. The fiery red light of dusk spilled across mounds of corpses; men and horses lay where they had fallen, for too few survived to see to their removal.

The field was a charnel house, full of the stink of death and slaughter, but for all the care that the lady showed, she might have been strolling through the carpeted halls of Camelot. She strode through the corpses without seeing them, until she reached the hill.

The hill stood at the heart of the field, and it was about this hill that the last of the battle had been fought. It was here that the King had met his nephew in final combat. Now, both lay still upon the slope; the King in his once-bright armour and the young knight in black.

Morgana stopped first beside her nephew. She knelt beside him and laid a finger on his throat; there was no flutter of life in his breast and no whisper of breath from his lips. She had held out little hope for him; his breast had been laid open with one great blow from Caledfwlch’s shining blade. His face still kept its rare beauty, but in death his eyes had lost their brilliance. His smile had died long before his body.

“My poor, poor boy,” Morgana sighed. “What did I make of you?” She reached out and closed his eyes. She laid her dark cloak across his body to cover the terrible wound in his chest. “Rest now. Go to your love and be with her forever.”

She rose to her feet and moved on up the hill, coming at last to the very summit, where Arthur lay, his body impaled on Mordred’s spear, the very spear that she had given to him. His life’s blood spilled freely from this mortal wound, but he was not yet dead.

Morgana knelt by the King and lifted his head. A ragged breath escaped his body.

“Arthur,” Morgana whispered, stroking his brow.

“Morgana,” he gasped. “Then… you have won.”

“No,” she said in a voice choked with tears. “Oh, my sweet brother; how could this ever be victory? I have lived all these years with rage and hatred for your father in my heart, but know you not that I have never hated  _you_.” She bent and kissed his brow.

“Camelot,” Arthur said. “Morgana; will it last?”

Morgana shook her head. “Camelot is empty, Arthur,” she told him, stroking his face with a gentle hand. “The dream… I am sorry.”

“I should have done more,” Arthur gasped. “Perhaps…” He sank back into his sister’s arms, fighting for breath.

“It was not to be,” she whispered. “Not on such foundations. Rest now,” she told him. “Soon your men will come to bear you up and I will take you to a place of peace. It is the least that I can do after all that I have wrought.”

With a great effort, Arthur reached out and clasped the hilt of Caledfwlch. He drew the great sword up beside him and held it out to Morgana. “Sister; this sword today tasted the blood of my kin, of my…  _son_.”

“I know.” Her heart ached for him; that he had known the truth all this time and said nothing was a testament to the strength of the man she had unwillingly destroyed.

“Let Caledfwlch shine no more as a symbol of hope and greatness,” he begged. “Send it back from whence it came and let it lie beneath the waters, until time and forgetfulness wash it clean of my taint and the hour comes around for it to rise again.”

“This I shall surely do,” she promised him.

“And tell Morgause…” he began, but then his strength failed him and his eyes closed, and Morgana thanked the fortune that stole his senses then, before he must know the worst.

The survivors came, alone and in pairs, in some cases those who had striven bitterly against one another now helping their erstwhile foes to walk. Old wounds and bitter rivalries would not be healed by this day’s bloody work, but it would be many a year before any who fought at Camlann had the stomach to raise arms to any save in direst need.

Morgana bid the faithful Bedwyr and his comrades bear up the King and of Mordred, and bear them to the shore of the lake. Here, beneath the bright moon, a boat awaited, and the fallen knights were laid upon biers and tended by fair ladies of great nobility.

“And what of the throne?” Bedwyr asked. “What of the sword? All of Arthur’s nephews are dead and no son was born to his union.”

“The throne shall lie empty,” Morgana replied bitterly, “and let each look to his own, for a dark time lies before us.”

“And the sword?” Bedwyr asked. “Surely the sword can bring us hope in this darkness.”

Morgana lifted the blade and proffered it to Bedwyr. “Will you take a blade, stained with kinsman’s blood, and try to forge a new union?” she asked. “Think you that any alliance born of this blade will be fair and bright after this day’s dread work?”

Bedwyr shook his head sadly.

Morgana lifted up her arm and cast the sword far out across the waters of the lake. The mist closed around the blade and the water swallowed it up.

“Look to your kinswoman, the Queen,” Morgana instructed. “She will bear much blame for this, and she will have need of a good friend. And see that my sister is buried with dignity, if not honour.”

“My lady, I shall,” Bedwyr swore.

And then Morgana stepped into the boat and sat between her dying brother and her slain nephew, with a hand upon the brow of each. With barely a breath of wind the boat slid away from the shore and vanished into the night, bearing its noble passengers into legend.


End file.
